Amelie gasps, making me jump. My eyes locate my pile of discarded clothing. I’m ready to dive for my dagger buried beneath them when she gasps again, then turns toward me with a wide smile. She holds a shimmering pink dress up to herself, swishing the hem of the fabric back and forth. “Evie, can you even believe your eyes?”
I let out a sigh of relief and join her at the wardrobe to examine the gown. Its fabric is thin and gauzy, like Lorelei’s, but the skirt is constructed of numerous layers, making it look like petals of a flower. Dresses may not be my favorite, but I must admit it’s pretty.
She puts it back and pulls out another, this one in a seafoam green. Again, she holds it up to her body. “Each is more stunning than the last. Have you ever seen anything like this? What are you going to wear?”
I look back at my pile of clothes. “I’ll probably wear my trousers.”
Amelie’s mouth falls open aghast. “No. How could you when you have all this at your disposal?”
A feeling of unease ties my stomach in knots. I feel oddly betrayed by Amelie’s excitement over the dresses. Aren’t we supposed to be angry about all of this? Still, I can’t bring myself to dampen her sudden joy.
She replaces the seafoam dress, then takes out another, purple this time. The skirt is made of shimmering silk decorated with tiny, amethyst jewels. The top is made from a similar silk in shades of purple, constructed of tiny, overlapping pieces of the cloth, making it look like scales. “Oh, I am definitely wearing this one.”
“What if these are supposed to be formal dresses?”
She shrugs, letting the towel fall to the floor as she puts the dress over her head. “Who cares? If I’m going to get eaten by a fae king, at least I’ll look good before I die.”
I’m stuck between a gasp and a laugh, then that sense of unease returns. Again, I feel betrayed by how well Amelie seems to be adapting. How could she feel so lighthearted after spending the best part of our ride here sulking and crying? She’s out of her wits.I’mbeing the sensible one. Aren’t I?
A knock sounds on the other side of the door, and Amelie suppresses a shriek. She hurries to pull the dress the rest of the way down, succeeding just as Lorelei steps inside.
“Brought your things,” the fae says, four bags in hand. Three are Amelie’s, while one is mine. As she crosses the room, I realize for the first time that her gait is less than graceful. There’s something crooked about the way she walks, her steps not dainty like Foxglove’s.
She reaches the dressing table and hefts the bags on top of it. When she turns to face us, she catches us staring. Amelie tugs at her gown while I pull the towel tighter around me. “What?” she says, pulling her head back. “Did you not want your things?”
I lift my chin. “In the human world, a knock doesn’t forewarn one entering. You usually await permission to enter first. Especially when one is known to be bathing.”
A corner of her mouth lifts but her eyes narrow at me. “Well, aren’t we fussy. I may be your lady’s maid, but the first thing you need to get right is this: you aren’t in the human world anymore. You’re lucky you got a knock at all.”
I glower. “I didn’t ask you to be my lady’s maid. In fact, tell the king we don’t need one. Let him punish you elsewhere for your crimes.”
Lorelei crosses her arms and strides up to me. I fight the urge to lean back as she holds my gaze with her furious olive eyes. “For one thing, I don’t tell the king anything. He tells me. I am his subject as you are now too. For another, I shouldn’t be punished at all. What I did to the Butcher was a favor to my people.”
I remember what Foxglove said about the traps on the Faerwyvae side of the wall, about Mr. Osterman selling fae parts. “You see, that’s where you’re mistaken. Hank Osterman would never do what your kind are saying he did.”
She bares her teeth. “Has it ever occurred to you that being human doesn’t make you an authority on everyone of your kind? The man you call Hank killed my lover in front of my eyes. I watched him do it. How? My leg was stuck in one of his iron traps. I watched as he took Malan and cut the wings from her back with an iron blade, sliced out her emerald heart, then stuffed her body in a bag. I screamed the entire time. The only reason I’m alive is because I got lucky.”
I blanch, taking an inadvertent step away from her.No, she’s wrong. This can’t be true.
She continues. “When he released me from the trap, I put myself under a glamour. It took all the strength I had not to give in to the pain from my wound. I could have let myself die, could have joined Malan in the otherlife, but I didn’t. Instead, I thought of those I could help if I made the Butcher pay. So I glamoured myself as a beautiful human woman. I crawled away from him, and he saw it as a seduction, a tease. He followed me, reaching to touch me, to put his hands in all the forbidden places he craved. I finally pulled myself in front of another of his traps. He watched a beautiful woman open for him. And he did all the rest.”
I feel like I’m going to be sick, her impossible words and my own logic battling for supremacy inside me. “It’s still cruel,” is all I can say. “You glamoured him—”
“No,” she snaps. “I glamouredmealone.”
I throw my hands in the air. “What’s the difference?”
“Do you know nothing about our magic? Placing a glamour on a human controls them, lowers their inhibitions, allows us to suggest actions they readily accept.”
This I know about, and there’s a rational explanation to it. Mr. Meeks theorizes that the fae emit a certain hormone during prolonged eye contact—an automatic function for the fae. That hormone, unfortunately, is what suppresses our amygdala, compromising our response to danger, opening our minds to suggestion. That’s why blinking is so effective at preventing a glamour. It keeps the fae from secreting whatever hormone is responsible for attacking our brains.
“Trust me, I know all about a fae glamour,” I say, hazarding a glance at Amelie, who blanches. “I’ve seen it happen before.”
“Then you’ll know that’s not what I did to the Butcher,” Lorelei says.
“What exactly did you do to him, then?”
“Like I said, I glamouredmyself, changing my appearance to look like a human instead. He saw a helpless woman before him. He could have done anything—ignored her to find the fae he’d captured, asked her what she was doing alone in the woods—but his vile urges were stronger.”
